React in Action

Chapter 4. Rendering and lifecycle methods in React

This chapter covers

• Getting set up with the application repository
• The rendering process
• Lifecycle methods
• Updating React components
• Creating a newsfeed using React

In this chapter, you’re going to start to pull together some of the concepts and skills we’ve covered so far to create your first React app. In past chapters, we’ve talked about dealing with data in React and the different ways that you can work with mutable (changeable) and immutable (unchangeable) data. But to build even more robust components, you need to take advantage of the full component API, dive into lifecycle methods, and learn about the rendering process in React.

We’ll take a look at rendering, the process that React ...